2006-7 $47 million GST bonus- ask the people how should it be spent: Humphries

Make the compulsory third party insurance on our car rego cheaper! Or, pay some money to open it up to competition like NSW’s green slips.

NRMA has had this market without competition for too long.

and again pure brilliance!

I’ll suggest a ‘work for the dung’ programme, which would encourage recalcitrents to get a real job or keep shovelling shit.

Brilliance, pure brilliance.

But we would need extra people to clean up all the camel dung. Thus creating extra jobs.

Yes a train, not light rail.

Nice point Jey, although put several Camels in a line and it’s called a Train.

light rail for cats and camels

though if we had lots of camels we wouldn’t need light rail

does that mean we should buy camels, or light rail for camels?

and camels

Light rail for cats.

fix the fucking footpaths. i went for a wander around the streets last night and was disgusted.

Stanhope’s put out this snarky press release, following up what I said about Gary Humphries having no right to have a say in what the ACT Government does with the money. He also says the community is consulted about what to spend the federal monies on each year. Not yet online so I’ll stick it here:

COMMUNITY HAS A SAY ON TAX SPEND

ACT Senator Gary Humphries had obviously found his move to federal politics unsatisfying and was angling for a return to relevance in ACT politics, judging from his unsolicited advice on ACT budgetry matters, Chief Minister Jon Stanhope said today.

“Senator Humphries today made the ludicrous suggestion that GST revenue somehow be separated out from other forms of revenue available to the ACT and that the community be consulted on how it should be spent,” Mr Stanhope said.

“I would have imagined that as a former chief minister of the ACT – albeit briefly – Senator Humphries would be familiar with the extensive consultation that occurs with the community in the lead-up to every ACT Budget.

“Every year, key community organisations are invited, in writing, to help identify priorities for government expenditure and about 100 submissions are received. Coincidentally, the letters requesting input for next year’s Budget were mailed by the Government just last week. In addition, the Government receives constant representations from individuals and organisations throughout the year, and these all feed into Budget considerations.

“I imagine that this consultation is a great deal more thorough than the community consultation the Howard Government has undertaken in relation to how it should spend its own $13.6 billion surplus. Perhaps Senator Humphries can tell the people of the ACT what representations he has made on their behalf in relation to that particular pot of money.”

Mr Stanhope said it was intriguing that federal politicians continued to portray the GST as somehow different to other forms of revenue, and to portray increases in GST revenue as some kind of ‘windfall’, particularly when the Howard Government was simultaneously ripping away from the ACT $13.5 million in corporate affairs compensation over the next three years.

“What has Senator Humphries done to represent Canberrans on that score?” the Chief Minister asked.

Mr Stanhope said it was also intriguing that the Howard Government seemed to think the alleged GST ‘windfall’ could be split infinite ways, like the magic pudding.

“In recent times we have been counselled by the Commonwealth to spend this ‘windfall’ on health or skills or to offset the cost of petrol. Now we are being advised to ask the people of Canberra where it should go. The GST is a tax, pure and simple, no different to any other tax. It goes into consolidated revenue, just like the revenue gained from every other source. Senator Humphries would do better to focus on how he might best represent the interests of the ACT from the backbench of an impotent Senate than to be nostalgically longing for a return to local relevance.”

I noticed them! I even rung them up about one in my street. They fixed it pretty quickly but it’s quite a band-aid job.

How about spending a few million bucks on road safety measures, as well as investing in a couple of visible patrol cars (and RBT’s outside of Christmas) rather than static, useless speed camera vans.

It might help slow down motorists on roads that aren’t speed camera designated

Or maybe even fix some of the million potholes on Canberra roads that have appeared in the last 6 months. (Am I the only one who has noticed this?)

Queanbeyan?

how about paying the Federal Government $47million to move to somewhere else ?

Seriously,

a direct injection of funds into ACT Mental Health as it is a basket case at present.

More social housing in satelite towns…that worked in Moscow.

How about replacing the middle bit of Northbourne ave with a series of in ground trampolines?